The scientific study of butterflies and moths, from the Ancient Greek λεπίδος (scale) and πτερόν (wing)

high noon

Church today was fun until coffee hour, when I felt

just how hard everyone was working to love me—

then the whole thing made me want a cold shower.

As always, to the beach. The cormorants huddled on a rock like punks.

The waves ripped off like bandaids.

I watched.

I always want to pin the day like this, with its wings wide open—

if I breathed on them, they’d still flutter.

sundown

A couple years ago, I sat before a middling sunset with Doug and Laurie—

no clouds in sight, just the color draining out of the sky,

a sickly yellow, a rotten peach—

and we decided it wasn’t a work of God; it was the Intern.

All week, we gave the Intern unsolicited advice

like little gods, and laughed and laughed.

Months later, I sent them another picture, a sunset I wanted to lick.

Definitely God, I texted.

Or maybe, they replied, the Intern is getting good.

twilight

I’ve written into the cave of silence underneath myself before,

so I think I know how the Intern felt the first time he melted light onto the ocean,

whisked up a cirrus cloud and stretched it pink across a deepening sky.

Emptied out. Airborne. Effervescent. Clean.

The hymn today had a note: Tenderly, with confidence. I’m trying.

But I’m always craving an end: stalactites, stop motion, the sussurus of dusk—

dawn

Every sunrise, I start from scratch.

I need to remind myself all over again about the world.